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Re: Biden Reveals Location of Secret VP Bunker

Originally Posted by Lerxst

Or, whoever Clifts source is. If someone at the party told her Biden said this and then she ran with it as an unnamed source, well then it's just your typical media stunt and nothing more. I wouldn't necessarily call her a liar at this point.

However, if she names an independent third party witness as her source then all of sudden Biden is back in the spotlight and Clift has a more solide and defensible foundation for the story. Of course, just because somebody told Clift this doesn't mean it's true, but it sure makes you want to ask more questions, maybe someone interview more of the "head table" guests who might have heard the statement.

It appears somebody lied at some point in this whole mess. I'd call Clift a marginal journalist if she didn't check out a rumor before printing it.

"I believe in a Spinoza's God who reveals himself in the harmony of all that exists, but not in a God who concerns himself with the fate and actions of human beings."

Re: Biden Reveals Location of Secret VP Bunker

Originally Posted by Moon

It appears somebody lied at some point in this whole mess. I'd call Clift a marginal journalist if she didn't check out a rumor before printing it.

Well it's obviously losing steam rapidly as it's dropped off of Fox's front web page, behind such gripping stories as "Washington house fire sparked by dogs water bowl" and "Tampa Imam charged with sexual battery of boy, 13." Had Biden actually committed such a grave breach of security this wouldn't have gone away so quickly.

I don't know if Clift is a marginal journalist, she has a pretty extensive background. It doesn't even look like she wrote an article if you follow Fox's trail on the deal. It was Daniel Stone's blog entry at Newsweek and he looks to be relaying something she typed out somewhere about something someone told her they overheard Biden say. Fox just proliferated the story, making it look like Clift wrote an article detailing the incident. However if you dig into Fox's article they link back to the blog entry by Stone. I'm still trying to find where Clift actually wrote this piece, there has to be more to it. And now it's off the radar. I wonder why?

This just in from Newsweek's Eleanor Clift, a frequent purveyor of political anecdotes. She bring us an enlightening one here regarding the (quote) undisclosed location (unquote) we heard lots about in the days after Sept. 11. Here's Eleanor:

Originally Posted by Eleanor Clift

Ever wonder about that secure, undisclosed location where Dick Cheney secreted himself after the 9/11 attacks? Joe Biden reveals the bunker-like room is at the Naval Observatory in Washington, where Cheney lived for eight years and which is now home to Biden. The veep related the story to his head-table dinner mates when he filled in for President Obama at the Gridiron Club earlier this year. He said the young naval officer giving him a tour of the residence showed him the hideaway, which is behind a massive steel door secured by an elaborate lock with a narrow connecting hallway lined with shelves filled with communications equipment. The officer explained that when Cheney was in lock down, this was where his most trusted aides were stationed, an image that Biden conveyed in a way that suggested we shouldn’t be surprised that the policies that emerged were off the wall.

And if you read the article, it doesn't actually describe a "bunker." I didn't see anyplace where it said they went underground, only that there was a heavy steel door to a "bunker like room."

Re: Biden Reveals Location of Secret VP Bunker

Originally Posted by Lerxst

Well it's obviously losing steam rapidly as it's dropped off of Fox's front web page, behind such gripping stories as "Washington house fire sparked by dogs water bowl" and "Tampa Imam charged with sexual battery of boy, 13." Had Biden actually committed such a grave breach of security this wouldn't have gone away so quickly.

I don't know if Clift is a marginal journalist, she has a pretty extensive background. It doesn't even look like she wrote an article if you follow Fox's trail on the deal. It was Daniel Stone's blog entry at Newsweek and he looks to be relaying something she typed out somewhere about something someone told her they overheard Biden say. Fox just proliferated the story, making it look like Clift wrote an article detailing the incident. However if you dig into Fox's article they link back to the blog entry by Stone. I'm still trying to find where Clift actually wrote this piece, there has to be more to it. And now it's off the radar. I wonder why?

Re: Biden Reveals Location of Secret VP Bunker

As Mark Silva blogs for Tribune, Washington yesterday was "abuzz with word that Vice President Joe Biden reportedly had disclosed the location of the undisclosed location that his predecessor, Dick Cheney, made mysteriously famous."

What set it all off was a blog post by Newsweek's Eleanor Clift: "Ever wonder about that secure, undisclosed location where Dick Cheney secreted himself after the 9/11 attacks? Joe Biden reveals the bunker-like room is at the Naval Observatory in Washington, where Cheney lived for eight years and which is now home to Biden. The veep related the story to his head-table dinner mates when he filled in for President Obama at the Gridiron Club earlier this year. He said the young naval officer giving him a tour of the residence showed him the hideaway, which is behind a massive steel door secured by an elaborate lock with a narrow connecting hallway lined with shelves filled with communications equipment. The officer explained that when Cheney was in lock down, this was where his most trusted aides were stationed, an image that Biden conveyed in a way that suggested we shouldn’t be surprised that the policies that emerged were off the wall."

Roxanne Roberts and Amy Argetsinger write in The Washington Post that Clift's "source" was the club's newsletter, in which club President Dick Cooper of the Tribune Co. recounted what Biden had said to him at the dinner -- fully two months ago.

But Clift apparently put two and two together and got five. The room in question was not Cheney's secret bunker.

As Silva writes: "Elizabeth Alexander, Biden's spokeswoman, offered this explanation this afternoon: 'What the vice president described in his comments was not - as some press reports have suggested - an underground facility, but rather, an upstairs workspace in the residence, which he understood was frequently used by Vice President Cheney and his aides.

"'That workspace was converted into an upstairs guestroom when the Bidens moved into the residence,' Alexander said. 'There was no disclosure of classified information.'"

But too late -- Biden's latest "gaffe" has now entered the pop-culture bloodstream.

Pssstt! Did you hear about Dick Cheney's fortress hideaway under the Naval Observatory? Pass it on!

What seemed to be a bombshell national-security story of the weekend -- how Joe Biden blabbed about a secret bunker under the VP's residence -- began when a bit of secondhand dinner chatter hit the Internet and moved quickly through the blogs. Alas, it pretty much fell apart the minute we started making calls to ... you know, check what turned out to be a game of Telephone, Washington-style:

In March, Biden attended the Gridiron dinner (an annual off-the-record media schmoozefest) and made small talk with club President Dick Cooper of the Tribune Co. At one point, Biden casually mentioned a secure room in his new home, previously used by Cheney and his aides. Per tradition, Cooper recapped the evening for the club newsletter, which was sent out this month.

Last week, Newsweek's Eleanor Clift read Cooper's summary and posted her juicier version on the magazine's blog: "Ever wonder about that secure, undisclosed location where Dick Cheney secreted himself after the 9/11 attacks?" Biden, she wrote, saw the "bunker-like room" when a young naval officer in the residence showed him the hideaway "behind a massive steel door secured by an elaborate lock with a narrow connecting hallway lined with shelves filled with communications equipment."

FoxNews.com ran with the story and chided Biden for "divulging potentially classified information meant to save the life of a sitting vice president" and speculated it was part of a long-rumored underground construction project.
....snip.....
In fact, it's long been reported that Cheney used a Cold War-era bunker in Pennsylvania as his undisclosed location.
....snip.....
Cheney didn't return our calls. Cooper declined to comment, citing the off-the record tradition of the club.

Wow, Eleanor's source is the club newsletter. She didn't even actually hear it from a live person.

Hey Vicchio!!!!!!!!!

Last edited by Lerxst; 05-19-09 at 09:26 PM.
Reason: I shouldn't be mean like that.